Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)
Aims
We aim to ensure:
That children access a broad and balanced curriculum that gives them the broad range of knowledge and skills needed for good progress through school and life
Quality and consistency in teaching and learning so that every child makes good (or better) progress and no child gets left behind
Close partnership working between staff and with parents and/or carers
Every child is included and supported through equality of opportunity and anti-discriminatory practice
EYFS@ Milton Park.pptxEYFS at Milton Park Primary School
At Milton Park Primary School, the children free flow across the classrooms, hall and outdoor area. The team work closely with our nurture staff to share expertise and skills. Everyone works towards the same goal: to ensure every child achieves to their highest ability through learning through play and enjoyment. The phase is overseen by the Early Years Leader.
Curriculum
Our early years setting follows the curriculum as outlined in the latest version of the EYFS statutory framework that applied from September 2021.
The EYFS framework includes 7 areas of learning and development that are equally important and inter-connected. However, 3 areas known as the prime areas are seen as particularly important for igniting curiosity and enthusiasm for learning, and for building children’s capacity to learn, form relationships and thrive.
The prime areas are:
• Communication and language
• Physical development
• Personal, social and emotional development
The prime areas are strengthened and applied through 4 specific areas:
• Literacy
• Mathematics
• Understanding the world
• Expressive arts and design
Environment
At Milton Park Primary School, we believe in providing the children in the reception year with a fun and exciting experience where they are encouraged to talk, discover, create, practise, rehearse, explore, investigate and learn through their play. We will give them opportunities to work and play with adults and with friends, learn independence, learn indoors and outdoors, make a mess and tidy up! The children are encouraged to take responsibility for their own learning by making choices about the areas they play in. This is called Child Initiated Learning.
We plan a learning environment, both indoor and outdoor, that encourages a positive attitude to learning. We use materials and equipment that reflect both the community that the children come from, nature and the wider world; materials and resources are easily accessible and labelled with a picture or symbol. We encourage the children to make their own selection of the activities on offer, as we believe that this encourages independent learning. Resources are stimulating and interesting to extend and develop play. Adults should ensure that there is always a range of natural, open ended, real life resources to support and extend children’s learning and development within the EYFS.
Areas in the indoors can include:
Construction
Small World
Investigation Station
Creative
Sand
Water
Technology
Message/mark making centres
Home corner
Sensory/messy play
Deconstructed Role Play
Areas in the outdoors can include:
Water
Gravel pit
Mud kitchen
Deconstructed role play/Large construction
Fairy/imagination garden
Sand
Creative
Imagination and herb gardens
Access to the forest school area
The environment supports literacy and mathematical development because each area incorporates reading, writing and maths: labels, words and numbers are visible and used in meaningful ways and mark-making is available in all areas.
Opportunities to develop children’s fine and gross motor skills are considered when planning and the different areas facilitate progression in these areas including, but not limited to:
Funky finger stations
Climbing frames and PE equipment
Bikes
Jungle Gym area
We serve a culturally diverse community therefore there are puzzles, musical instruments, and books that reflect home language.
The children have access to the outdoor experiences every day and are able to freely move between the indoor and outdoor provision. The outdoor environment
Teaching and Learning
Good planning is the key to making children’s learning effective, exciting, varied and progressive. Effective learning builds on and extends what children know and can already do. In the Early Years this means planning must be flexible and allow the adults to respond to the interests of the group at any given time. Our planning incorporates all Seven Areas of Learning and Development and aims to offer opportunities for adult-led and child-led activities. We also recognise that play underpins all development and learning for young children and we aim to provide well-planned experiences based on children’s spontaneous play, both indoors and outdoors.
Staff respond to each child’s emerging needs and interests, guided their development through warm, positive interaction. Strategies, such as story scribing, are implemented. As children grow older, and as their development allows, the balance gradually shifts towards more adult-led activities to help children prepare for more formal learning, ready for Year 1.
Objective Led Planning
At Milton Park, we follow objective-led planning. This means taking the teaching into children’s play and allows us to group our children by their specific need in each area of learning. So, children who need more support in talk development and less in fine motor can get just that, rather than being in one ability group for both. This type of planning is based on delivering the objective to the children in play and not pulling the children out of play to come to an activity.
Staff plan activities and experiences that enable children to develop and learn effectively. Staff also take into account the individual needs, interests and stage of development of each child in their cohort, and use this information to plan a challenging and enjoyable experience. Where a child may have a special educational need or disability, staff consider whether specialist support is required, linking with relevant services from other agencies, where appropriate.
Continuous Provision Planning
Teachers plan for the areas of learning in continuous provision. They think carefully about incorporating reading, writing and maths opportunities in each area. Continuous provision transcends all areas of learning. When preparing resources for continuous provision, teachers:
Make sure that each area set up for continuous provision has the necessary resources to encourage children to play and explore in a variety of ways.
Offer a range of high-quality resources that will act as a good starting point for the children’s explorations.
Use open-ended questioning and sentences starters to engage the children in conversations and prompt their creative thinking.
Give children time to revisit what they did yesterday, last week, or even a few weeks ago.
We use the three Characteristics of Effective Learning to support our planning and teaching.
playing and exploring - children investigate and experience things, and ‘have a go’
active learning - children concentrate and keep on trying if they encounter difficulties, and enjoy achievements
creating and thinking critically - children have and develop their own ideas, make links between ideas, and develop strategies for doing things
Early Language
Books are included in learning areas outside of the reading areas. Adults make time to share favourite stories, rhymes and sing songs with individuals, small groups and large groups supporting these with actions, objects or puppets. Adults model language to support children: adults gain children’s attention before speaking and model appropriate communication behaviour; they match their language to the children’s level and develop language by extending children’s utterances; accept children’s language and model it back in the correct form.
Adults are always modelling the writing process and emphasise the purpose of writing for children, including story scribing. The school policy is that children write cursively. They encourage children to ‘write’ and ‘read’ what they have written to communicate with others. Children are actively encouraged to be involved in the writing process e.g. labelling displays.
Play
Children’s play reflects their wide ranging and varied interests. In their play, children can be inquisitive, creative, questioning and experimental and will learn at their highest level. Playing with their peers is important for children’s development. Adults are play partners. They play alongside the children to model new skills and support children to use them, how to speculate and test ideas through trial and error and encourage children to have a go and be creative and critical thinkers.
Through play our children explore and develop learning experiences, which help them make sense of the world. The adults model play and play sensitively with the children fitting in with their plans and ideas. The children are encouraged to try new activities and judge risks for themselves. We talk to them about how we get better at things through effort and practice and that we can all learn when things go wrong. They practice and build up ideas learning how to control themselves and understand the need for rules. They have the opportunity to think creatively alongside other children as well as on their own.
Seesaw
Milton Park Primary School ensures that all children in the Reception year have an online personal journal which records photos, observations, comments and assessments, in line with the Early Years Foundation Stage, to build up a record of each child’s achievements during their time with us. This evidence is used alongside their learning journeys and families are also encouraged to contribute.
Working with Parents
We recognise that children learn and develop well when there is a strong partnership between school and families. The school holds workshops throughout the year: including new entrants, phonics and reading. Families are kept up to date with their child’s progress and development through parents’ evenings, formal end of year reports and conversations. Additional meetings may also be arranged with the Phase Leader or Inclusion Team if there are additional concerns. The EYFS profile helps to provide parents and carers with a well-rounded picture of their child’s knowledge, understanding and abilities. Families are invited to contribute to learning journeys through contributions on Seesaw, reading logs, workshops and parents’ evenings; this feedback is encouraged and valued.
